In the third season premiere we expected a LOT from Scandal. Luckily Shonda Rhimes was willing to let Olivia Pope take off her white hat, at least for now.

On the Season Premiere of Scandal, it wasn’t all just a dream sequence. The public now knows that the President had an affair with Olivia Pope. Apparently her, Dad (right?!) was prepared and orders her onto a plane never to be seen again. Not that he wants her killed, just in a land far-far away. Liv refuses and calls in the big guns, literally, to meet with Fitz and (shocker #2) Mellie. The three convene in some sort of underground bunker and decide it’s best to only lie a little. The President and Ms. Pope had two encounters and it’s over. But it’s not, because meanwhile back at Pope & Associates, the rest of the team has uncovered and publicized a scapegoat. But Liv’s not having it and takes the poor girl on as a client before the credits roll. Oh, and Fitz did something really shady while in the military, but we don’t know what it was, and we NEED to know. But more on that later, for now 5 Awesome things you hopefully didn’t miss.

DADDY. ISSUES. So last season left us hanging on Olivia Pope strutting her stuff out of her apartment building only to be swarmed by reporters and subsequently swept up by the mysterious man who’s been having her followed for weeks, her (GASP!) Daddy. We soon realize “Daddy” comes with a lot of “Daddy Issues” and he may be the only man, other than Fitz, that she can’t quite keep it together with.

“Are we Gladiators, or are we bitches?” Pope & associates, well really just the associates, wrestle with whether or not to save their savior, and in the end Harrison puts a final question to his Gladiators in Suits.

“Where’s Jake?” That’s right, where IS Jake (Scott Foley). Upped from last season to series regular, Liv’s Dad assures her, and Felicity super fans that Jake has not been killed off. And we carry on.

Two is company. It seems as much as First Lady Grant has accepted her role as the other woman in the Olivia, Fitz, Mellie love/hate triangle, she is NOT prepared to let the public know that her husband has been carrying on an affair for years. In the most tense scene of the night (no music track needed), Mellie admits she will only admit to the public that her husband has slept with Olivia Pope TWO times.

Then I’d like to be a curator at the Smithsonian too. Apparently the company line is that Papa Pope is a curator at the Smithsonian. Sure, with high level national security clearance and hit men on speed dial. Whatever he’s selling, Cyrus is buying. Mr. Pope hands Cyrus a folder even the Chief of Staff’s clearance level isn’t high enough for. The folder apparently reveals some grave info about Fitz and his time in the military and I can’t possibly last a week without knowing exactly what is is!

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Sandra Smith is a graduate of Northwestern and Syracuse Universities where she wrote and studied and wrote. She currently earns her keep working on a variety of your favorite reality shows for HGTV, TLC, Discovery Channel, MTV and FUSE and dreaming of creating the next Law & Order. E-mail: sandra@whatelseison.tv